Possibly a Little Too Familiar
by DezoPenguin
Summary: Margarita decides that it's time for her to summon a permanently bonded familiar to aid her in hunting down the remains of the Archmage's followers. Only, she finds that such a summoning definitely follows the principle of "you get what you need, not what you expect."


Margarita Surprise pushed back the hood of her cloak. She'd worn it on her way out of town to this little copse of trees, but now it would just obstruct her vision while she worked. Especially as she was working by night, she thought as she hung her lantern from a convenient tree-limb and turned its wick up to give the maximum light.

From its sheath on her belt she drew her athame, a long-bladed dagger. In magical ritual, an athame was symbolic; its edges and point were rarely sharpened. Margarita's, though, was honed to a razor's edge, suitable for work as a fighting knife—which it had in fact been, both before and after Margarita had chosen it as her primary working tool in place of a wand.

With her free hand she flipped open the top of the satchel slung at the other hip beneath her cloak, then took out the grimoire carried inside. The slip of ribbon she'd used to mark the page made it easy to open one-handed, and the lantern shed enough light for her to see the intricate design on the page. She'd spent long hours studying it, not just the pattern of the Rune but what it meant, the symbolism of it and the way the magic flowed.

That was one reason why when the young witch started to draw the Rune, she didn't just trace its shape but actually cut it into the ground, the blade of her dagger slicing through the earth. It took her a good twenty minutes to finish laying it out, not just the basic pattern but the additional elements that each caster of the Rune had to add on their own, that represented themselves. When she started she'd been surrounded by the noises of the copse at night, the cries of night-birds, the chirrup of insects, the rustle of leaves and underbrush as small mammals passed through the foliage. By the time she was done, though, those sounds had faded, until even the crickets had fallen silent and the magic pulsed before her in a night that was still and dark, like all nature was holding its breath, waiting.

As was the magic.

The Rune that Margarita had prepared was unique among its kind. Most Runes were crafted to codify the symbolism of one kind or another of ritual magic, be it the Fairy Ring of Glamour, the Laboratory of Alchemy, or something else entirely. This one, though, could be kindled with any kind of magic. Spirit's Binding dealt with such an elemental principle of magic that the final twist could direct it however the crafter wanted it to go. Perhaps that was why it was one of the first Runes ever created.

It was the Rune to call a bonded familiar.

In magic, the word "familiar" denoted any supernatural creature bound to a magician's will. Human beings could not directly wield mystic forces, but they could command those who did, and this was how they worked their magic. A bonded familiar, though, was something different, what the commonfolk thought of as a magician's familiar, the black cats or toads or serpents of witch stories. They were a permanent companion, to be separated from their master only upon the death of one or the other. The bond pooled and enhanced the two's power, in most cases making the whole stronger than the sum of its parts.

Not every magician had a bonded familiar. Some didn't want one, to permanently tie up a portion of their power in a single familiar. In the witch-hunting days (days not that far gone, as Margarita knew well), a familiar that couldn't be dismissed could be lethal evidence. Others were unable to master the Rune; though the theory was basic, the execution of it was not so in the least. Alchemists had the worst of it since the ephemeral creations of Alchemy were simply too unstable to endure so long. And yet others simply found themselves unable to reach an appropriate relationship with a creature of their area of mastery suitable for a lifelong bond.

It was this final consideration that had driven Margarita to long hours of restless thought when she had first considered taking this step. She was, in fact, at or near master-class in two different fields of magic, and choosing which one to call a familiar with was not as easy as it sounded.

Her initial inclination had been to shy away from the devils of Sorcery. Such creatures were literal demons that, although bound to her service, would nonetheless possess an evil nature and seek to act on it. Temptation was a constant threat in Sorcery, and a bonded familiar would mean taking on that temptation at all times.

That by itself should have been enough to settle it for her, but instead it was the evil nature of the devils that _attracted_ her, made her think twice. They brought a very specific kind of power, one that she'd find very useful. The mechanics, the skills necessary, even the mindset needed for killing by stealth didn't change whether the victim was an innocent or a corrupt monster—yet that difference was the only way to find morality in what Margarita did.

It was therefore with not a little regret that she had ultimately set aside Sorcery and instead settled on Glamour. It was a decision that had called a bit too much on her younger life, where her character had been shaped by fear. Ultimately, she had decided to turn away from the benefits Sorcery could offer due to the risks it could bring.

The hellfire-and-brimstone preacher of her home village, Father Braastad, would have been proud of the tactic's success, and _that_ thought was almost enough to make her change her mind at the last moment. She was old enough now to know, though, not to make decisions based on spite.

Margarita pressed the point of the dagger into the earth and cut the final symbol of the Rune, then sheathed it, took out a needle-like lancet, and pierced her palm so that blood welled up. She turned her hand over and let the blood fall, and the Rune came to life, shining with emerald light.

" _By the sacred light that shines over all_

 _By the moon and the stars_

 _I pledge myself to the contract_

 _Let thee stand joined with me_

 _'Til trumpet sounds, and silence falls."_

The light blazed up and began to swirl and dance, agitated as it channeled the power of the summoning. For a long minute, then two, it went on, calling not merely upon a random creature of a general type as did a common summoning, but a single individual, one who answered the calling that was specifically Margarita's magic, Margarita's will. Shapes danced in the verdant mist, animals and birds and fantastical beasts, surging together out of green light that flowed like smoke, then drifted apart like the shapes in the clouds.

Then the light died down, the figures vanishing and dimming and collapsing back into the earth as the Rune itself faded away.

A black shape fluttered up out of the marked circle like a moving shadow, coming to rest on one of the overhanging tree-limbs. Green pinpricks stared down out of the dark patch. In a couple of seconds, Margarita's eyes adjusted to the absence of the Rune-light in the much dimmer radiance of the lanters so she could tell what she was looking at.

She _felt_ it well before that, the tangible presence in her spirit that was the link between magician and familiar, but far more potently than with common summonings. Something pulsed between them, strong and bright, but also somehow incomplete, a great bridge with missing stones.

The bird fluffed its feathers, then began to groom itself with a tapered black bill.

"You're a calm one," she told it, unable to keep a wry twist out of her voice.

"I'm a crow. If you wanted flighty, you should have summoned a hummingbird." It—he—actually managed a gesture with his folded wings and a head-bob that looked for all the world like a shrug.

"You're a corbie."

"A fey crow. Don't nitpick. Those are not the boots of a nitpicker."

He had a point; the boots in question rose to over the knee and were laced up the side.

They did, however, have flat heels. Margarita kept her whims of fashion firmly within practical bounds. It was a lesson she'd learned through painful experience.

"You're awfully sassy for a familiar that I summoned for a permanent bond."

The corbie fluffed his feathers, his green eyes shining piercingly.

"It's surprising," he remarked. "Bonded familiars are called based on their personalities, right? The call looks for what suits a particular magician's needs, right? What they're looking for in their heart, even if they don't know it for themselves."

"I'm impressed," Margarita said. "Bonded familiars for hedge-wizards often have a lot of technical knowledge of magic because that's part of what they're looking for, but I didn't expect it from you."

She wasn't quite sure if a bird could actually snort, but somehow he managed to pull it off.

"Please. What good would I be to you without basic knowledge? You're some kind of assassin, right? I can't help you if you have to explain half of what you're doing."

"Assassin?"

"You're using a dagger for a magic wand!" He flicked his head, gesturing with his beak at her athame. "That's not exactly usual. Either you expect to be fighting hand-to-hand while trying to use magic, or you just like creepy stuff. You're probably not a professional duelist, or else you wouldn't have to be doing this in the woods at night, and if the dagger was about the aesthetics instead of practicality you wouldn't be summoning me at all; you'd be using Sorcery if you were a little pustule on society's rump or Necromancy if you weren't. So, we have a magically talented fighter who sneaks around in the dark to prepare major magical workings."

"That's very good deductive reasoning."

"Quick wits are a standard crow trait, and absolutely one you need. If all you wanted was someone to sneak around silently at night with you, you'd have summoned some creepy old owl. Pompous windbag."

"Who?" Margarita said, smirking slightly.

"...Puns. There may be hope for you yet."

"That was an unexpected reaction."

"It only stands to reason. I've figured out why it is you summoned me, after all."

"Oh? What do you think?"

"I think that it's not a coincidence that you summoned someone with a sense of humor."

"As opposed to, say, that owl you were talking about."

"I didn't mean one of them in specific; in my experience they're pretty much all like that. But yes, that's it exactly. As an assassin—"

"I prefer the term 'hunter,'" Margarita corrected him. "An assassin is either working for a political or religious cause or for money."

"Oh, so whatever you're up to is personal, not professional? That all but confirms it."

"Confirms what?"

"My job here. I'm going to guess that you don't have a lot of close friends, people you can unburden yourself with, laugh and joke around, get stinking drunk with at their third cousin's wedding, and do something you'll probably regret involving a pig, a printing press, and ladies' undergarments?"

"That sounded remarkably specific. Do you have any Ballentynes in your family?"

The corbie gave that remark no attention, though whether that was because it was pointless or because it hit a bit too close to home wasn't immediately obvious.

"The point is, that's a pretty lonely existence. I'm guessing you're probably pretty prone to brooding, too. That's never good for a person."

Margarita looked up at him and folded her arms across her chest.

"So your hypothesis is that I summoned a crow with an excess of sass because somewhere in the depth of my heart I decided that I needed a constant companion with a tendency towards humor?"

He did the avian shrug again.

"Well...yes. I mean, again, you called me. You didn't call on a devil to help with more efficient methods of murder—er, 'hunting.' Which suggests that you care about the morality of it all, and that _really_ makes for a brooder. Are you any good as a poet?"

She ignored his last quip in favor of the substance of his comment.

"How can you tell that I even know enough Sorcery to summon a devil as a bonded familiar?"

"Um, no offense meant, but you kind of stink of it."

" _What?_ "

He jerked backwards, comically flapping his wings to keep his balance on the tree limb. "Don't _do_ that!" he exclaimed once he'd secured his perch. "I mean that the familiar bond works two ways. I can feel that kind of thing."

"I should have realized that," she murmured.

"So, anyway, it's pretty clear: you need me." He launched himself off the limb with a flutter of wings, wisps of shadow swirling in his wake as he flew over to her and settled down on her shoulder.

"Watch the claws."

"What? Who summons a bird for a familiar and doesn't have a shoulder perch? It's part of the whole look. We could get you a hooded cloak and you'd be really ominous!"

Margarita chuckled, and decided not to point out that the cloak she was currently wearing actually had a hood.

"I thought you were supposed to help keep me from brooding and ominous stereotypes?"

The corbie sighed, wings sagging.

"You," he declared, "are no fun."

"I'll have you know that I'm extremely fun. I just prefer to spend that fun on men without beaks."

"I'll have you know that the beak of Vasco the Corbie is desired by most and envied by the rest."

Laughing, Margarita turned to leave the copse.

"Are you _sure_ that there aren't any Ballentynes in your family line? That's a very familiar kind of humility."

"If you wanted humility, you should have summoned a dove. They've got a lot to be humble about."

"You're not really fond of birds, are you?"

"Of course I am! I'll have you know that I'm very fond of ravens! Oh, and there's rooks; I get along well with rooks. And you'll never hear me say a bad word about a jackdaw, let me tell you..."

Margarita was snickering all the way back to the inn.


End file.
